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Schwarzenegger ?Terminates? Employee Rights (Part 1)-Why?

By James Peters

As the end of the year approached, Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed several employee protections the California legislature passed in 2007. While he felt it was important to give full protections to military spouses whose husbands or wives were on leave, he deemed other employees to be less deserving of similar rights.

This is the first in a series of posts on several important employee rights bills that the legislature passed this year, but the Governor vetoed last month.

AB 1707

Assembly Bill 1707 created a $750 penalty provision against employers who refuse to provide employees access to their personnel files.

Employees in California have a statutory right to view almost anything in their personnel files. However, there has never been any penalty in place for employers who refuse to comply with this law.

If an employer refuses to grant access to the employee’s file, the employee could bring a lawsuit, but other than ordering the employer to open the records, the court has not real power to punish employers who willfully break this law.

This modest penalty would have provided an employer with more incentive to comply with the law, but since the bill was vetoed employees are left with no threat of any monetary penalty to use against employers who know they really have nothing to lose for refusing to follow the law.

AB 435

Assembly Bill 435 is similar to AB1707. It was a bill that proposed allowing employees to recover double damages from their employers if they do not pay their employees the minimum wage.

Like the law granting access to personnel files, California’s minimum wage law allows employees to sue to recover their unpaid wages, but there is no additional penalty they can recover from their employer if they win.

Essentially, the law is currently set up so that an employee who is already making less than minimum wage to begin with must pay an attorney to sue in court and recover their wages, with nothing extra awarded for their trouble (and no further penalty to the employer for not paying).

This law was an attempt by the legislature to provide for stiff penalties against employers who prey on the employees who need the money the most (sometimes not paying their employees at all), but apparently Mr. Schwarzenegger believed no such penalties were needed under the law.

Legislation | Minimum Wage | Personnel Files

Related posts

• "Side Effects" of California's Increased Minimum Wage
• Commissioned Salespeople & Overtime, Part 1: "How much?"
• Commissioned Salespeople & Overtime, Part 2: Are You "Commissioned"?
• Commissioned Salespeople & Overtime, Part 3: Qualified Employer?

Full post as published by California Employee Rights Blog on November 03, 2007 (boomark / email).